Cornelius A. Thiels, D.O., M.B.A. , a surgical oncologist at Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minnesota, explains that surgery is often the best option for patients with colorectal liver metastases. Hepatic artery infusion pump chemotherapy provides a controlled dose of chemotherapy directly to the liver, making surgery an option for some patients.
I think when it comes to colorectal liver metastasis, one of the most important things is trying to get people to surgery because we do know that surgery is their best chance of a cure with hepatic a infusion pump chemotherapy. We're able to offer some of those patients the ability to try to convert them to receptible, convert them to the potential of a curative intense surgery. The pate infusion pump chemotherapy is where we insert a pump under the skin and the abdomen and then that pump directly connects to the liver. Then after surgery, patients receive chemotherapy filled into that pump and then that chemotherapy slowly goes to the liver over a couple of weeks and even months after surgery. And that's important because we can now treat tumors that are not currently responding to normal chemotherapy or tumors that are responding, but we need a better response. We need them to shrink more or prevent them from coming back. And so we think this is a very exciting treatment option for very selected patients in order to try to cure them of their colorectal live metasis.
